Following up last year’s surprisingly popular "10 things you likely didn’t know about Darkroom" and your many requests for more tips, we put together a second edition that focuses on workflows in Darkroom. Click through to read it all right here in this thread.

Starting a startup is hard. This thread will contain some key advice I think are particularly noteworthy:

1. “If you’re not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.” - @paulg The first version of my product was not great, but hey, it worked.

2. Don't build in a vacuum. You should build your product out in the open for the world to see. You will gain valuable feedback from users if you build publicly, and provide insights which ensure you are building a product users truly want. cc @rrhoover @sama

3. As a young founder, a massive weakness is age and the lack of credibility. Developing partnerships, trying to acquire customers. etc have all taken so much longer. In fact, when I mentioned my age, a few investors just walked away. cc @Jason

4. Work on what makes you feel excited. Working on something that you don't believe in will cause you to make rash product decisions, resulting in loss of user loyalty. @fredwilson

5. Take care of yourself. While doing the occasional code sprint can be incredibly useful, working 24/7 and disregarding your health just to build a great product is not a wise choice.

Most software founders, particularly in B2B, need to get radically better at sales. @Steli , who is the best person for explaining the scrappy stages in the beginning and then building out a team with scripts and processes, wrote a guide to:

For technical founders it is irrationally, obscenely hard to reverse years of programming (ba dum bum) that sales is a value-destroying activity. Sales is CLEARLY a value-creating activity, contingent on you have a value-creating product.

The world will not drop what they are doing to adopt your work. This is particularly true in B2B, where simply building a better mousetrap won't overcome the activation energy required to get people with additional non-mice problems to prioritize changing mousetraps today.

This is very non-obvious for founders because founders are not often people who *want* to be sold to. We often come from a background where trying out tools is a bit of a fun hobby. We like looking at all the options, making charts, and ripping out partially complete tests.

"This week I unsuccessfully trialed four software options for automating that thing that has been killing us. Our actual production process remains the same as last week. Don't worry; this was a great use of time." is not a thing you want to write in a progress report to manager.

(THREAD) Pre-election Russia collusion may take down Trump. It's equally possible the Trumps' pre- and post-election collusion with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Israel will do it—a course of collusion also connected to the Kremlin. I explain here. I hope you'll read on and retweet.

1/ I must stress how unbelievably complex the "Grand Bargain" theory of the Trump-Russia case is—a different thing from saying it's not substantiated. It's substantiated in *almost every single particular*—it just *also* happens to be very confusing. Not byzantine—just confusing.

2/ The basics: Saudi Arabia, Israel, and the UAE all view Iran as their chief regional enemy. Iran is propped up by Russia. Therefore the Saudis, Israelis, and Emiratis all need a US government willing to find a way to get the Kremlin to *stop* supporting Iran in the Middle East.

3/ The best way to get Russia to stop supporting Iran—or reduce support—was/is to drop all sanctions on Russia over its 2014 annexation of Crimea, as that'd be worth *trillions* to the Kremlin over the next decade. Everyone knew that Clinton wouldn't do this—and that Trump would.

4/ Per the NYT, on August 3, 2016, Donald Trump Jr. met secretly at Trump Tower with a Saudi and Emirati emissary, George Nader, as well as an Israeli intelligence expert, Joel Zamel, with *significant* ties to both Israeli intelligence *and* Russian oligarchs allied with Putin.

Gather round, Gentle Readers. It is time I tell the story of the worst decision I ever made in an office. Some of you have heard this. Some have not. Whatever you do in your office today, this week, the rest of this year, you can console yourself by recalling this tale.

A long time ago, I was a talent agent. I worked for a woman named Susan Smith, who had her own small boutique agency. She was known for three things:

1. She had fantastic taste in clients. If there is someone you admire, odds are good that at some point, she was their agent,

2. She could negotiate a deal like few who have ever trod the earth. Casting would give her all the money they had budgeted for that part, plus a little more, plus promising to get her dog Barnaby groomed. She was magnificent to watch.

3. She was insane.

I'm sure you're thinking, "Quinn, it's the entertainment industry, they are all insane." Yes, many are. So consider this; if you told someone you worked for Susan, people who worked for insane people would look and you and whisper, "I hear she's insane."

IMPORTANCE AND CHARACTERISTICS OF GARUDA PURAN.

On the request of Garud, Bhagwan Vishnu, the rider of Garud, described this Puran based in Taksharya Kalp. It has ninteen thousand shlokas.
This book begins with a question and goes on to describe the Shrishti.

Then it describes the Surya puja vidhi, Diksha, Shradha, Nav vyuh puja, Vishnu sahastra naam kirtan and dhyan, Yog, Mrityunjay puja,Mala mantra, Shivarcha, Gopal puja, Trailikya mohan Shridhar puja, Vishnuarcha, Devpuja, Sandhya, Pancham tattva, Durga and Chakra Archana,

Maheshwar puja, Pavitra ropan puja, Murti dhyan, Vaastu maan, Prasaad, Sarvdev pratishtha, Ashtaang Yog, Daan dharm, Prayaschit, Narak description, Chakravyuh, Jyotish, Samudra shastra, Swar gyan, Tirth, Importance of Gaya, Different Manvantars, Pittra's, Varna dharma,

Dravya shudhhi, Samarpan, Vinayak puja, Grah yagya, Ashram, Shouch, Pret shudhi, Niti Shashtra, Vrat katha, Som and Surya vansh, Hari vansh, Bharat akhyan, Ayurveda, Medicine in Ayurveda, Rog nashak kavach, Garud Kavach, Traipur mantra, Prashna, difficulties in vyakaran,

Chhand shastra, Discipline, Snan Vidhi Tarpan, Bali Vaishvadev, Pavarna Karma, Sapindan, Dharmasar, Repentence of sins, Prati sankraman, Karmafal, Yug dharm, Vishnu bhakti, Method of Namaskaar to Hari, Narsingh strotras, Gyanamrit, Vishnuarchan strotras, Principles of Sankhya,